GameSalad Game of the Month – August: Project BOOM

Congratulations to Project BOOM, the GameSalad Game of the Month – August

We are pleased to highlight the work of a relative newcomer to the GameSalad community, Max Beaumont!

Project Boom is a collaborative effort of some of the GameSalad community’s finest, all working under the Ventora Studios monicker. A physics puzzler that meshes familiar, exciting concepts with colorful, attractive art and design while tipping its hat to similar games in its genre, Project Boom is another great example of the fantastic innovation developers can bring to the table with GameSalad. Timing and quick thinking are crucial, as is bomb placement – all concepts that roll together into an extremely fun and challenging game experience.

We sat down with Max to learn a little more about his inspirations and the making of Project Boom:

GameSalad: Hi Max! Very pleased to see such a great first effort with your game! Tell us about Project Boom.

Max:Project Boom was inspired by the game ChuckABoom, which is a flash game. Gilles Landry (aka Tshirtbooth) took the idea and turned it into a much bigger, better, and more enjoyable version of the original game. After seeing such potential in Project Boom, I decided that I original wanted to buy the game from him. With the help of Gilles and many other great developers, we were able to complete a new version of the game and take it to market.

GameSalad: What makes Project Boom a unique, must-play experience?

Max: I think Project Boom is unique in many different ways. One of the
most notable is that the game is entirely free to play and has no advertisements or in-app purchases. This is becoming more and more rare in the AppStore world today, and especially for full 80 level games. Besides the pricing aspect, I think it is also unique since the concept is entirely different than any other game on the AppStore. The amazing overall design along with the stunning visual graphics makes the game hard to put down. That was really a goal of mine, and from all the positive feedback we have received, I think we achieved it.

GameSalad: When you’re not developing games, what are some of your hobbies outside of GameSalad?

Max: When I am not working on Ventora Studios, I design websites. I have designed sites for several different companies along with some personal sites of my own. Although for the time being, I have been working on GameSalad full time.

GameSalad: How did you discover GameSalad?

Max: I discovered GameSalad last year when I was looking for a way to
easily develop iPhone games. I needed a program that was simple to use, but powerful. Not expecting a program like this to exist, I was surprised to have found GameSalad. Yet I was very thankful when I did. The simplicity of it all really drew me in and got me excited to begin work. When I saw all the incredible games that had already been made with GameSalad, I was in awe. I knew this was something I really wanted to get involved with full-time, and I love every part of GameSalad.

GameSalad: When developing games, do you work independently or with a team?

Max: When developing games I always work with a team. For Project Boom, I worked with Gilles Landry (Tshirtbooth), Ace Conell (MyNameisAce), John Papiomitis (JohnPapiomitis), and many other very talented GS users. All in all, we had about five Sous Chef’s, two line cooks, and two members all involved in Project Boom in some way. With this amazing talent behind us, I knew Project Boom was going to be hit!

GameSalad: Any new projects on the horizon we can look forward to? What are you currently working on?

Max: We currently have a few projects in the works that excite me very
much. Although I can’t reveal much at the moment, I can say that among these planned projects is an endless runner game, which is set to release sometime this fall. We also have a point and click game, and a sequel to Project Boom that we will be starting development on soon after our next game releases. We have a lot of great games planned for this year and we can’t wait for everyone to see them!

Thanks for taking the time to talk with us, Max! We look forward to seeing more from Ventora Studios in the future!

About Us

GameSalad is the revolutionary game development platform that allows anyone to create the game of their dreams without writing a line of code. It’s also the best way to introduce programming concepts, game design, and digital media creation to your students.

Launched in 2010, GameSalad has been used by over one million aspiring game developers and has powered over 75 games that reached the top 100 in the App Store, including multiple #1 games.